Certain types of infrasound have been blamed for inducing chilling unease, hallucinations, and general discomfort among people. Some experts have even gone so far as to stick infrasound with the blame for ghost-sightings and mass hysteria. Some of this is probably hype, but given the broad number of possible sources of infrasound, especially in urban environments, might this be worth a little closer scrutiny?
Testing for the presence and amplitude of infrasound could be a somewhat quantitative means of finding ways to improve the “feeling” of a building by detecting and reducing sources of these unpleasant sub-audible noises. For business-minded folks, this could mean improved productivity. For aesthetics-minded architects, plain old comfort. Infrasound detection technology might not be particularly well-known, but it’s certainly being activily developed, at least in the vulcanology community.
Of course, designing to increase infrasound activity might be a fun way to build a haunted house…
